Hodge-podge

Moving has started the inner monologue or whatever you want to call this increased thought process. Looking at pictures, deciding if the wallpaper from the orphanage bathroom is really something I want to keep. I now have two large boxes of paper recycling, cardboard etc and three large boxes of stuff to give away - so if you are interested in all my MCAT stuff from Kaplan you can have it - personally I'm tempted to burn it. I also have box of textbooks I haven't been able to sell - if you wondering about the title on the blue one it's Theoretical Inorganic Chemistry very useful for transitional metals theory, although it's old. All this remembering has made me feel lonely - I was talking to Dr. Sara about this, and while Cheryl grumbles when I bemoan singledom, it isn't the fact that I'm single that's an issue there are just nights or even days when you feel like your life has this void. Fundamentally we are interactive, and need interaction despite what we would like to hold on to - and this whole moving transition is the removal of an interaction knowing that there maybe very little to fill it. The flip side being there is very little to distract from the gaps, holes in this developing self.

I started this blog with the hopes that I would be able to write my way through a growth period - knowing full well that I need to come to grips with being 25 and nowhere close to what I thought I would, like moving. I was sure I would be married before it would happen again, I guess I'm learning nothing is sure - there are no guarantees...

On to the other side of the stuff going on in my brain - I was reading the Business section of today's newspaper, the main article was talking about Elizabeth Arden's/Britney Spear's fragrance's appropriation of a BC firm's marketing slogan. This firm sells t-shirts and products from which 1 dollar goes to the charity of your choice. Okay, this smells of the GAP's AIDS fundraiser where being "charitable" became a fashion statement while increasing GAP profits. Explain how a product price doubles - like their jeans but the donation price is a pittance? It frustrates me, as many things do, when there are organizations that donate the majority of their funds i.e. http://www.bloodwatermission.com/ granted they are a Christian organization, so if you have a problem with it - then go with Oxfam or another related organization. There are hundreds of reputable organizations working outside of the consumerist culture - so while you do buy your free-trade organic coffee or what have you from Starbucks consider other firms, local and more grassroots - like Ethical Bean from Vancouver- their Family Blend donates to Adoption Services of BC, not to mention they are carbon neutral... speaking of coffee I need another cup of their Folk Festival blend - smells like chocolate.

As well this discussion of Dobson et. al - leadership is a very defined role within Scripture, and yes leadership is of importance. But the key note is that it is to be Godly leadership - and a concern with mega churches, capitalism and a complete ignorance of true need in N. America right now is not that. Concerns should be with the health - physical first, spiritual second and economic dead last of the population - in that there is an obesity epidemic - we over eat to fill the voids - and yet we do nothing to address those issue - poor living conditions, inadequate access to education and health care. The success of the white middle America has come on the backs of everyone else - be them the poor, the Migrant workers or the African American population. We've missed that the first shall be last, and the last first in our grapple for the biggest portion of the pie. The other aspect to leadership is a population that must be able to discern false prophets - I don't know if I am prepared to go as far as saying Dobson is, but he's sure pushing the envelope. 1 Peter 2: 3 (NIV) "In their greed these teachers will exploit you with stories they have made up." In addition the focus on wealth/capitalism is a clear throughout the Scriptures. I am not without fault - but the first step here is acknowledging and then making the small but meaningful steps towards change. The first meaningful step is for our population to grab a hold of their faith - and start thinking and learning for themselves.